For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching • Hacker News Board

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#471

Post by BeFlatXIII » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 12:56 PM UTC

soligern wrote: post #276

silverpepsi wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something I heard a few years back put my life experience as a kid in perspective. At least for me, in the most important way possible, it doesn't sound like regular school at all. The main deep life impacting characteristic of standard public schools is coerced unwelcome company. You're forced by law to be around the same bullies for 5, 10, even 12 years. The natural order with organic friendships (and indeed probab…

That doesn’t sound right. For all of human history bullies who were bigger and stronger made the rules. The weak were ostracized. If anything, what you’re doing in homeschooling is reverting away from the norm and creating a sheltered environment. This is a double edged sword, you can turn your kids into fragile beings incapable of dealing with a harsh world but at the same time they will probably have productive, pr…

> For all of human history bullies who were bigger and stronger made the rules

This is why firearms and high explosives have been such blessings to humanity.

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#472

Post by ethbr1 » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 1:05 PM UTC

CuriouslyC wrote: post #328

ethbr1 wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you? Because I don't think recent child development trends bear out children learning things in spite of being exposed to less of it. If it sucked, and the requirement for it to happen is removed, it simply doesn't happen. And the lessons that it taught remain unlearned.

Research shows that people learn well when there is the right amount of stress, and the right challenge. If the stress and challenge exceeds that amount it can quickly become destructive, which is what we see in your typical public school for any child who isn't primarily concerned with "fitting in." At best, public school is useful. At worst, it's a massive waste of time and absolutely destructive to a young psyche.…

"Fitting in" is no small thing. The world would be better today if more people had the ability to empathize with someone not-them, sufficiently adjust their own way of interacting to put others at ease, and generally be less abrasive and fragile.

And if we want to talk in absolutes...

At best, public school provides an opportunity to learn socialization that cannot be replicated in a home environment.

At worst, you get murdered.

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#473

Post by bequanna » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 1:08 PM UTC

gemstones wrote: post #152

AlwaysRock wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just as a counterpoint... I was homeschooled from 2nd grade until sophomore year of high school. I played sports the entire time (was the captain of various teams), had plenty of friends, and was pretty social. Even still, I felt like my social skills were significantly stunted when compared to others my age. It took a long time for me to feel comfortable just hanging out with others because most of my social time wa…

I feel the exact same also homeschooled. It’s also interesting being in this thread with homeschooling parents - I remember hearing about how “homeschool groups provide the same level of socialization” back then, and it wasn’t any more true then than it is today. Schooled kids get 8 hours a day with peers and you get 1 if you’re lucky. Not the same.

> Schooled kids get 8 hours a day with peers

As a parent, I have no say over who these “peers” are, how they treat my child, or what BS they try to push on them.

As someone who was surrounded by some pretty bad kids during High School I am very comfortable with my children not getting that experience.

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#474

Post by magic_hamster » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 1:23 PM UTC

WicWacWok wrote: post #446

opportune wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can’t both statements be true? If I had to guess, most of the original homeschoolers did it because they had strong, fringe religious beliefs. Then in your generations more secular parents started homeschooling but it was still a pretty highly self-selective group (a stay at home parent who didn’t mind staying at home most of the day teaching their kids, a belief they could do better at educating their kids even with…

Tbh I still associate homeschooling with conservative christianity. They have a much stronger incentive to homeschool than others by a large margin.

That's interesting to hear, as someone living in a different country I always assume that the reason to homeschool is so you could give your children better education.

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#475

Post by aleph_minus_one » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 1:27 PM UTC

SamBam wrote: post #465

aleph_minus_one wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The distinction between macroevolution and microevolution sounds like nonsense. Even from a biological perspective this distinction is not nonsense: couldn't there exist an additional mechanism that is not arbitrary mutation and survival/selection of the fittest, which could be an additionally important for the formation of species and macroevolution? Candidates for such possible additional mechanisms have been pro…

This "couldn't there exist..." is doing a lot of work that I don't understand. "Couldn't there exist different laws of gravity for big things like planets and small things like rocks, which explains why I've never seen rocks attracted to each other?" Yes, there could in some alternative universe, but not in this one that we know of, and it's not necessary to explain why you don't notice rocks being attracted to each…

> "Couldn't there exist different laws of gravity for big things like planets and small things like rocks, which explains why I've never seen rocks attracted to each other?"

Something very related is a topic that is seriously discussed among physicists:

> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics

The problem with the existing theories of gravitation which seem to work quite well on the scale of solar systems is that there does seem to exist evidence that some observed data on the scale of galaxies might not be well-explainable by these theories. See

> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics#Ob...

Very recently new evidence for MOND came up:

> https://phys.org/news/2023-08-smoking-gun-evidence-gravity-g...

> https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37051241

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#476

Post by the_only_law » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 1:30 PM UTC

anon84873628 wrote: post #236

mvnuweucxqokii wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a strawman. The steelman version is something like the following chain of reasoning: (a) gender identity is something that everyone has that is distinct from sex, (b) with enough introspection, everyone can discover their true gender identity, (c) if you don't have a strongly felt gender identity, you need to introspect, (d) if introspection does not yield certainty then this suggests genderfluidity, or even w…

That's not the steel man, that's a straw man where you just flipped the politics of the scenario. Letting kids feel safe to introspect and question their gender expression is a good thing. The implication that kids will be _systematically_ forced to delay puberty or undergo a transition they don't want is absurd and not a valid "chain of reasoning". Yes, I'm sure it has happened and could continue in rare instances b…

> That's not the steel man, that's a straw man where you just flipped the politics of the scenario.

That’s just HN

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#477

Post by softsound » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 1:38 PM UTC

silverpepsi wrote: post #244

glitchc wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This means the kids gather together in one location because many kids can learn from the person doing the teaching. >Often as well it makes sense for the parents all to contribute a little money so that instead of the parents having to teach things that they are not expert in, the can pay as a group for someone with subject expertise to assist. >It can be problematic though gathering so many kids into one house for…

Something I heard a few years back put my life experience as a kid in perspective. At least for me, in the most important way possible, it doesn't sound like regular school at all. The main deep life impacting characteristic of standard public schools is coerced unwelcome company. You're forced by law to be around the same bullies for 5, 10, even 12 years. The natural order with organic friendships (and indeed probab…

I can think of a guy who became a local bomber in my city who was homeschooled. He would put bombs into people's mailboxes or leave packages by their front door, my uncle's family knew them when they went to homecoming stuff together. He was eventually caught and arrested but idk homeschooling isn't for everyone.

I worry sometimes how these kids will struggle when they are faced with the real world.

Personally I loved going to a charter school and I was really excited we got to have extra large classes sometimes because you can't always fit all your friends in your grade in one class but for specific art classes we often tried too. My charter high school was really great, my college experience was definitely not... It was too small for one thing looking back now.

Also won't ostracizing a bully make them more destructive? I know a lot of them become suicidal after a while and more destructive (based on experience understanding those I know better) they did get better though, they just didn't know how to process what they were going through.

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#478

Post by twodave » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 1:38 PM UTC

standardUser wrote: post #279

twodave wrote: post #242

If my wife and I were to put our 4 special needs kids into public school it would result in them having a bunch of unbelievably negative experiences: - they would NOT receive a quality education or be taught to be self-learners. - they would be passed along, even with failing grades, putting them further behind their peers, highlighted their differences and denying them their dignity. - they would all end up in socia…

A good friend has two children, one with fairly severe autism and one with extra-strong interpersonal skills. They both go to the same school, but the kid with autism gets special care, including specialized teachers working with him. This is certainly not to say you are wrong! Rather, it's to point out the vast differences between one public school and another. I have to remind myself sometimes that, even though my…

Our kids have all been diagnosed with FASD, but in our state at least that isn’t enough to qualify for specialized care. Not that it matters a ton, because we would still be fighting the other bullet points. We can get scholarships through the state if we get our kids diagnosed with a mental handicap, and that costs around $3k per child and requires them to be evaluated intensively (which is more difficult for some of our kids than others). So that’s the path we are taking, because at least after the $3k much of the therapy they each need can be reimbursed through the state (up to a certain amount each year).

There are a ton of kids in this situation—-either adopted or in foster care, mom abused drugs and alcohol during the pregnancy, and even those of us who pay to adopt these kids from birth/early age (~$30k each for us) there is just very little support available. We are essentially doing the state a favor by not putting these kids into foster care or making them be the public school’s problem, and we don’t get repaid unless we happened to know about FASD, get a diagnosis and apply for an adoption subsidy BEFORE adopting them. It’s absurd.

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#479

Post by bavell » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 1:40 PM UTC

tp34 wrote: post #406

labster wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a child in a public school, you have no right to freedom of association, and no right to freedom from association. Your school chooses your classes, and the state will use violence to ensure you attend those classes, bully or not. In home school, there is less people and more choice. There are no perverse incentives that value attendance over education and health.

> In home school, there is less people and more choice. I think you meant "there are fewer people." Were you home schooled? Perhaps public school English would have been a better option.

> Were you home schooled?

Funny, as a public-school attendee, I would expect the opposite given how many of my peers sailed through on cruise-control with crappy teachers who were sometimes dumber than the kids.

Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching

#480

Post by bavell » Sun, Aug 27, 2023, 1:49 PM UTC

masklinn wrote: post #387

hahn-kev wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a kid is a bully then the parents organizing the group can kick that kid out (as a last resort). Additionally if a child is being bullied they can tell their parents and the parents can take action directly, this can happen publicly but there's a lot of layers of administration making it non-trivial. In a way the group homeschool can be thought of like a small private school, it's just simpler to handle personal p…

> If a kid is a bully then the parents organizing the group can kick that kid out Or they can approve of the bullying. Or they can do nothing because they don’t care, or because they’re socially subservient to the bully’s parents. It’s simpler to handle personal problems in a small group, it’s also easier for them to fester in a closed group.

1. What parent would approve of their kid getting bullied? What are you talking about?

2. If the parents care enough to homeschool, why would they not care about bullying?

3. Socially subservient to the bully's parents? This feels like a hopelessly contrived and niche edge case that is effectively meaningless because it would be so rare

4. I'm not convinced personal problems fester moreso in a closed group (see: armed forces), and further I'm not convinced homeschooling groups are closed in the first place

All this to say I don't think your argument has any merit and is based on convenient and unlikely hypotheticals.